"Zero minus one hour," the loudspeaker droned, in a Chinese dialect.
In a deep cavern in the hinterlands of Asia, men responded to the command coming over the speaker system. Already driven to the point of exhaustion, they were working harder than they had ever worked before. The moment of victory, for which all true Asians had lived, was near at hand. The launching of this bomb would make the Asian Union master of the world. Orders had come through to launch this bomb immediately.
"Zero minus forty-five minutes," the speaker said. The drone had gone from the voice of the officer watching the time. A rising excitement appeared in the tones as if he, too, had caught the scent of fear rising in the vast underground depot.
So much was left to be done. The atomic warhead was already in place, waiting for the day of launching, otherwise the task would have been impossible. The driving engines were complete, but had to be fueled. The steering equipment was almost ready, only the installation of the left gyroscope was necessary. This was at hand waiting to be installed. Five technicians constantly got in each other's way as they tried to slip the delicate instrument into place.
"Zero minus thirty minutes!"
The gyroscope was eased into place and tested. It was found to be in perfect working order.
In the course plotting room, the final calculations were being made. Wind direction and velocity aloft had been noted across half the planet. This had some importance on the launching and landing end but had no significance when the bomb itself was out of the atmosphere.
The target had been figured and refigured. Actually, the target was anywhere on the continent of North America. If this bomb struck anywhere in the Mississippi valley, the whole watershed below the striking point would be scoured clean of all life. Water carrying radiation downstream would account for that.
"Zero minus fifteen minutes!"
On the outside of the mountain, in a special observatory constructed for this precise purpose, radar scopes for tracking the rocket were ready. Instruments in the laboratory there were for the purpose of changing the course of the super bomb, if it veered too far from its destination. The technicians there were on their toes. They had no guards to encourage them but they needed none. They knew what would happen if this bomb failed to land and the fault was traced to their door.